I probably shouldn’t be as surprised as I am considering how much amazing progress this digital streaming and simulcast thing has seen in the last few months alone, but I am seriously applauding FUNimation for this move. Four days lag time between the Japanese broadcast and an official English sub (presumably) isn’t quite simultaneous, but it’s good enough for me. That’s about how long I generally waited to watch my weekly Soul Eater anyway, so it’s great to see FUNi stepping up like this and beating the fansubbers to the chase since they do already have the series licensed.
I’m really curious to see how many fansub groups this official stream deters. Since the stream is only available for those in the US and France, there will likely still be foreign language sub efforts. It’s probably presumptuous of me, but I feel at least a little confident in guessing that a significant portion of fansubbers and leechers reside in the US. I don’t usually keep up with these things, so I’m not sure if any major fansub groups have already announced FMA:Brotherhood as a project, but if there have been, I wonder if any will drop it out right following this announcement.
[View the rest of this entry…]
I got back from MomoCon late last night. Still completely exhausted, and it will take me a while to catch up with everything, but it’s a good thing my LJ feeds are one of the first things I check back up on because it let me know that a trailer for the upcoming DOGS OAV is now up on its website! (Click the link that says “movie” near the bottom.)
The animation looks gorgeous and, for me at least, erases many of the doubts that came with the first look at the artwork a few months back. The character designs are very faithful, as are the backgrounds, and the action. The music reminds me a lot of Baccano!, which threw me off a little at first — it’s very energetic, upbeat, and kind of hookey, which clashes with some of DOGS’s darker undertones. But considering that the OAV will only follow the storyline from “Stray dogs howling in the dark” rather than Bullets&Carnage, the humorous energy isn’t all that misplaced.
The trailer itself isn’t a great indication of story, so those unfamiliar with the manga probably won’t be impressed by much, though the action does looks nice. I’m really eager to see a trailer that will show more general background music and that will show speaking parts. I listened to the first drama CD again not long ago; it still sounded great, so I’m excited to see it all match up with their animated images. Gleeeee.
In the meantime, I’ve got “volume 0” of Viz’s release of the DOGS manga on preorder and can’t wait to get it~.
I’m back from AWA. I somehow managed to miss every single panel that I had wanted to attend; managing an artists’ table was just far more time-consuming than I’d anticipated. I couldn’t step away for more than ten minutes at a time without feeling horribly guilty. In retrospect, I’m not sure I would have wanted to be in the room when Cartoon Network dropped the ball that they were canceling Toonami after its eleven year run. This so soon after the injustice they’re doing to Code Geass and Moribito? I’m sure that panel room exploded into rioting. And I’m not so sure I wouldn’t have been among the rioters if I’d been there, even though I personally haven’t watched Toonami in years.
It’s a Catch-22, I suppose.
[View the rest of this entry…]